Web Browsers Compared

The browser war is once again at it’s peak. Google Chrome has shaken up the web browsers landscape on Linux in terms of speed and it’s agile release cycle. Older established players like Firefox and Opera have responded with their own faster release cycles. All of the browsers allow ends uses to preview and test upcoming versions. Firefox now has the Aurora channel and Opera has the Next release channel to preview the future versions.

This review compares the current in-development versions of the Chrome, Firefox and Opera web browsers on Linux. Is the new release cycle of Firefox and Opera helping them to match Chrome in speed and performance? Cutting the chase, lets find out.

Browsers Tested

Opera Next 12 pre-alpha amd64

Firefox Aurora 8.0a2 2011-08-25 amd64

Google Chromedev 15.0.861.0 amd64

Test Methodology

All extensions disabled in each browser

Only one test was run at a time

All browser cache in a tmpfs ram disk

Test System

CPU – AMD Phenom X6 1055

RAM – 8 GB DDR3 1300

Disk – Intel X25V 40 GB

Graphic Card – Zoatc Geforce GT 460 768Mb

OS Ubuntu 11.04 running Unity/ 2.6.38-11-generic #48-Ubuntu SMP

The Tests

V8 Benchmark Suite – version 6

Google Chrome dev is the stand-out winner in the benchmark, for obvious reasons. This is the bench mark that developers of Google Chrome uses to baseline he V8 javascript engine and most likely Chrome is heavily optimised for this benchmark. Firefox and Opera fall way behind as a distant second and third respectively.

Sunspider

This is another javascript benchmark. Here the difference between Chrome and Firefox is not so dramatic as in the V8 benchmark, but tables are turned. Firefox is significantly faster in this benchmark, interestingly even Opera is faster then Chrome.

HTML 5 Test Suite

The HTML5 test suite indicates how well the browser can render HTML5. Google Chrome with 342/450 leads the pack, with Opera coming last with 286/450. Firefox is in between with 314/450.

This will be a bench mark to watch out for in future. As HTML5 becomes more widespread in the future, the winner will be the one that has the best support for HTML5.

Acid3 Test

Only Firefox Aurora misses out the perfect hunderd and could manage 97/100; while both Google Chrome dev and Opera Next came up with perfect 100/100.

Final Words

It is clear from all the benchmark Chrome remains the king of speed and performance on Linux.

These preview versions of the web browsers we have compared will be released before the end of this year, and Chrome will remain the leader for 2011.